Colin & Jenkins
by Scriptorial Therapy
Summary: Lily is visiting her favourite bookshop when she senses that something is amiss - A man gets lynched for absolutely no reason in broad daylight. Why was it that this was becoming commonplace? Why was it that no one tried to intervene?


**A/N:** To state the obvious, I am not JK Rowling. She is the genius behind the Harry Potter series. In extension to this, the character Donna was an OC created by Jewels5, author of The Life and Times. I do not take credit for her either. Enjoy :) Reviews are always appreciated.

* * *

She could practically live in Colin & Jenkins. It was her favourite bookshop.

The quiet was never unsettling. It reminded her of autumn, when the golden leaves spiralled to the ground in unbroken silence. She would occasionally hear pages turn or the sound of the door clicking shut. But each sound had a solemn quietness, as if knowing she did not want to be disturbed.

It was unusual that as a patron she was allowed to stay in the bookshop whilst reading, although she always made a point of purchasing the books. She sat by the window, where a number of volumes were on display in the little bay. On the best days, sun would warm her skin as she read through novels like _Sanitatum_ or _Deadly Venoms. _On that particular day, it was one of the colder days, but Lily was no less grateful to be in Colin & Jenkins. It was overcast and chilly. The windowpane was spotted with drizzle and everything outside looked grey. So, she felt extra warm and safe inside the bookshop, her nose tucked inside a book. She could have stayed there forever, contented. But as she turned a page, her eyes were distracted from the black print, and she noticed for the first time that a heavy mist was gathering outside. At first, she glanced back down, thinking very little of the typical London weather. However, as she tried to re-immerse herself in her reading, Lily realised that the glass she was leaning against had become colder. When she looked back up, she could see the fog had become dense, as if it was pressing against the window. Feeling nervous, she got up and began to weave her way through the shelves until she reached the counter.

"Mrs. Jenkins?" she called hesitantly.

After a moment, an older woman lurched out from a hidden back room. She brushed back her silver hair. "Yes, dear?"

Lily motioned towards the front of the shop and the older witch's face fell as she noticed the fog. She took a few weak steps forward. "How long has it been like that, love?"

"It happened terribly quickly."

With trepidation, Mrs. Jenkins drew her cardigan shut over her drooping bosom and walked hastily behind the counter, as if to afford herself further protection. She crossed her arms nervously. "Ralph," she cried over her shoulder in a warbling voice.

"You don't think…it's some sort of spell?"

"No, no."

"Or…" Lily's haltered. "Dementors?"

"Of course not. In Diagon Alley?"

But Lily was not convinced, and neither was Mrs. Jenkins. "Ralph!"

Mr. Jenkins wobbled out from behind the hidden door. "What's the matter?"

With a motion of her clawed hand, Mrs. Jenkins had directed his attention to the heavy fog. It was as if a cloud had engulfed their shop. The humble wizard blanched, and hastily polished his spectacles. There was something ominous about the mist. None of them could put their finger on it. But it was definitely unnatural.

"Deb, get in the back room. Miss, you should come, too."

"Thanks, Mr. Jenkins. But I think I may go home."

"No, dear!" cried Mrs Jenkins. "Stay."

"Like you said, it can't be Dementors. Not in Diagon Alley."

Refusing to listen to their protests, Lily tucked her book into her bag and withdrew her wand. She smiled at the old shopkeepers plaintively before leaving the bookshop.

The cold was bitter. She squinted, uncomfortable in the change of climate. A bone-deep chill bit at her body and she shuddered. The air in her lungs turned to to ice. With a deep breath, she summoned a Patronus. It was feeble, non-corporeal. A wisp of warmth in the cold. But it was enough. With it pouring from her wand like steam, she began to part her way through the fog.

Further ahead, the sight of a crowd began to form out of the haze. Several witches and wizards were gathered nervously around what seemed to be some strange robes, dangling above as if suspended on a fishing hook. Lily stared in confusion, trying to understand. Most of the curious people who had braved the cold were now backing away. One man, the closet to the scene, was weeping. Despite a cold that was now causing her heart to clench and making it hard to breathe, Lily pushed through to the front.

She realised with a terrible shock that a man was hanging, limp, from a streetlamp. He was what she had mistaken as a tangle of robes. The lamp from which he swayed had gone out. She couldn't be sure if he was alive or dead, but she imagined he was somewhere in-between, because he was attracting a group of Dementors like bees to honey. In constant propulsion, they ebbed and surged towards him. Streaming robes and crooked claws. Inhumanely cold.

Lily had never seen a Dementor before, only having read about them in her textbook. She had understood from the description that they oozed decay and despair. That at their very core, they were Dark. Soulless yet soul-sucking. She understood that. She had cognised that fact. But never had she internalised it, known it, felt it. She was so cold that it wasn't a feeling, it was a state of being. She felt empty of any hope or bravery that had inspired her as she left Colin & Jenkins.

The others had now retreated further back, and despite feeling some shame, she began to follow. There was only about four or five of them, and she was frightened to be isolated from the throng. She was breaking into a cold sweat. Her Patronus puckered and then dispersed like icy breath. She stumbled back, fear clutching her. "What happened?" she whimpered.

The man besides her grabbed her arm. "Are you a muggleborn?"

She blinked at him, too terrified to reply. Her eyes darted back towards the limp body.

"Are you?" he pressed.

She should be answering confidently, proudly, but she couldn't. Her throat was too tight. Is that why that wizard was hanging, swaying like a clock's pendulum? Tick tock tick tock. Her time was running out. Her baltering heart was measuring the seconds. She pulled her arm from his grasp and began to stumble away.

But the Dementors had tasted her fear and were turning blindly towards her, like Nifflers nosing their way towards unseen treasure. The crowd scattered, one of the witches shrieking. Lily raised her wand, and through dry lips she muttered the Patronus charm, but the wisp of magic evaporated in the wake of the Dementor's staggering breaths; so she tried again, fingers trembling and lips numb but all that was running through her mind was the limp man and the word mudblood, mudblood pounding like a funeral drum.

She closed her eyes and thought of the happiest thing she could think of. And she cast a full corporeal Patronus charm. The Dementors drew back sharply. With a slight sob, she disapparated.

* * *

Remus shuffled the_ Daily Prophet_, reaching with one hand to blindly pat the tabletop until he felt his coffee mug. He took a swig but choked mid gulp as his eyes found the article.

* * *

Sirius was considering a new leather jacket, rubbing his thumb over the smooth fabric before becoming preoccupied by the price. It was only as he heard two witches talking in hushed voices that his head snapped up.

* * *

Peter had slept in, and so, descended the stairs in a groggy state to greet his mum. She was standing over the sink, hunched slightly, and told him there had been another lynching.

* * *

"Where at?" James demanded impetuously into his mirror. His fingers, clasped around the ornate handle, had become white at their joints.

Sirius' expression was a mixture of nonchalance and poorly concealed trepidation. "Diagon Alley. Just outside of Colin & Jenkins and across from Eeylops Owl Emporium."

"Colin and Jenkins? That's Lily's favourite bookshop."

"Oi, don't panic. The lady said it was just the one wizard."

"But was anyone else there? Who got hurt?"

"I dunno. But there'll have to be an Order meeting at some stage."

The order meeting was much sooner then James expected, and if he weren't so agitated, he would have been impressed by the promptness of it all. It seemed very well organised—by noon, the following day after the incident, the group had assembled around the mahogany table of the Shacklebolt's dinning room. In order to keep the meetings confidential, a different Headquarters was set up each month. Surprisingly, there was little debate about whose house would be rented out for the meetings. But of course, a murder did make everything run more efficiently, if only to satisfy the guilt of having not prevented it.

Most people had seats, but a few were standing around the peripherals of the room. Arms were crossed and expressions stern. Sirius was playing with his lighter under the table, and James could hear the gentle chink as he flicked it open and close.

"Thank you to everyone who has attended in spite of busy schedules and an appropriate feeling of anxiety. I especially must thank the Kingsley family for so generously lending out their residence as a place for us to meet." Dumbledore brought his spindly fingers together to a pinnacle and examined them for a moment before addressing the room of witches and wizards. "I understand that many of you are despairing that this has been the third attack on a muggleborn wizard this month and little retribution has been shown."

There was a murmur of agreement, which granted James the opportunity to voice his own dissent. His eyes kept returning to Lily, who had arrived too late to get a seat, but had been forced to take a stool that had been dragged out of the drawing room, seated like some morbid guest of honour. She sat awkwardly at the table, her eyes fixed on her lap. Her face looked white. James hadn't had a chance to speak to her yet, but he was dying to. He had found out from Marlene Price that she had been a key witness and had spent the previous afternoon being interviewed. He was upset she hadn't owled him sooner.

"From this point forth, we must accept that we cannot make swift and simple arrests. Those who attacked Mr Morrison were in civilian, wizarding robes which complicates matters, as they all claim to have been under an Imperius curse—"

A louder grumble of dissent sounded—the usual excuse.

"This of course, will be investigated. However, it is not lost upon us that many of those who attacked Mr Morrirson are sympathetic with Voldemort's views. And we can assume that at least one of them was a Death Eater."

The mood immediately changed with the mention of his name, and everyone hushed slightly, as if remembering why it was they were afraid.

The meeting was mostly a formality, and for that reason, James grew bored of it. There was no talk of action, no plan of attack being formed. It was just talk, and he was getting sick of talk. A man gets lynched for absolutely no reason in broad daylight. Why was it that this was becoming commonplace? Why was it that no one tried to intervene?

He voiced this concern when there was a lull in the questions.

Dumbledore sighed and eyed James under his half-moon glasses. It was a look that brought him back to the Headmaster's office, not even a year before. It made him feel small again, and with that look the fight went out of him.

"As you can imagine, Mr Potter, there were only a few people in the crowd who were not in support of the lynch mob."

"Have these people been questioned? Or are they all as useless as that last lot?" Donna Shacklebolt demanded.

"Unfortunately, they had their memories wiped before any of the Aurors arrived at the scene."

A grumble of dissent, once again.

"However, one witness disapparated prior to being approached by Death Eaters."

There was a shift, and everyone looked at Lily. After a moment, she seemed to register the silence and looked up.

"Er, right."

Lily hastily brushed her hair from her pale face. Everyone seemed to be waiting expectantly so she cleared her throat.

"They used Dementors. I'm not sure how, I didn't know any existed outside of Azkaban. But it was frightfully incapacitating. No one could really _do _anything."

"What, so no one considered casting a Patronus?" Dawlish demanded.

"I did cast one initially, but even mine was timid. It's difficult to summon up a cheerful thought when you have Dementors floating around and a man's body hanging from a lamp post." Lily's voice had gained some courage now, and was even harsh in its response. Dawlish shrank back. "It was the first time I've had to cast a Patronus, I've only read about it theoretically."

There was a murmur that scattered about the room as people shamefully admitted they had never attempted to cast a Patronus charm. Up until that day, there had never seemed to be any need.

James was finally satisfied by the opportunity for some action. The aurors would be teaching other members of the Order how to cast a Patronus. Alistor Moody was particularly rambunctious, stating in a purposely-loud grunt that he had wanted this sort of material covered in the schooling syllabus. Some hesitant people even prepared to give it a go. As everyone became carried away, Remus wound his way over to James. They sat together, watched for a moment as Dawlish demonstrated a Patronus which took form as a hare for Sirius' benefit. After a moment, James acknowledged Remus.

"Aren't you doing to give it a go?"

He shook his head gently. "My Patronus is a wolf," he caught sight of James' expression. "A regular woof, mind you."

"You've done it before?"

"Just once. I read about it and wanted to try it. I was in Fifth Year. Lily and I practiced together during a tedious prefect patrol."

"That's lucky," he replied bitterly. "She needed the practice, it seems."

"She was never able to produce one."

James knotted his fingers together. Lily had wandered over to the table set up with refreshments, but when an onslaught of people came her way with prescriptive questions, she had vanished. James was dying to ask her what had happened, but that was the question everyone had been asking her. He was a little upset that he had been the last to find out—that she hadn't told him her self—but he was too proud to admit it.

It was easy enough for Remus to read on his expression, nevertheless.

"She went into the drawing room if you want to speak to her. She won't mind."

James nodded appreciatively and left him.

The drawing room of the Kingsley household had a musty smell and heavy drapes with a moth-eaten quality to them. Someone had duteously placed a vase of flowers on a small table, but they had begun to wither. Perhaps they had been placed there to breathe a floral perfume into the air. The effect was nice only in its gesture.

Lily touched her wand to the flowers, so that they regained their former splendour. The spell would wear off within a day, but she made the effort anyway.

This was how James found her.

"Hey," he said, leaning against the doorframe. The rabble outside was quieter now.

Lily looked around and met his eye. She seemed hesitant, and he hated that.

He didn't want to bring up the lynching or what she had seen. He didn't want to bring up how helpless he felt, finding out so late, not being able to provide any comfort or help. He felt thick and awkward and like he was sixteen again, trying to figure out how to best approach her. There she was, willing to receive but making no effort to give. And he didn't know how to start things off.

"Sorry," he said, almost out of habit.

"For what?"

James shrugged, crossing his stringy arms.

She shrugged, too, and walked over to the loveseat. He followed her and they sat down together. A cloud of dust billowed up as the sofa creaked ominously beneath them. They both laughed, closer now. Their proximity helped the feeling of distance between them that James couldn't shake. He cleared his throat loudly. "The Patronus idea was good. I'm glad they're finally teaching us something useful."

She nodded. "Yeah. Who would have expected Dementors, you know?"

He felt sick at the very idea of it. He turned to look at her properly. Her wide green eyes, with their flecks of gold around the iris. Those freckles on her nose. Her plump bottom lip, torn from where she had bitten it. All those familiar features. He had come so close to losing her. How could a world without Lily Evans exist? He couldn't imagine never seeing her again. Never seeing her blush or laugh. "What…what did it feel like?" he asked gently.

She frowned as she recalled the memories. "It's like…It's like you can't breathe. I imagine it being like an asthma attack. You break into this cold sweat and you just freeze up…I's like all the happiness is the world, all the hope—it just vanishes."

He frowned at his knees. There was a lump in his throat, but he tried to swallow it. "How are we supposed to contend with this shit? The Order must be tripping if they think we can come up against Dementors."

"James, we're doing better than you think."

"We're not," he replied edgily. "Three people died this month. You could have been—"

"One of them?" she finished. She rolled her eyes. "Do you think I'm unaware of that? Why do you think I'm in the Order, James?"

But he had tears in his eyes, and he knew that his glasses wouldn't disguise the fact, so he stood and peeled over to the spindly flowers to hide his face. His dramatics did little other than force Lily up off the sofa to follow him. She touched his shoulder, turning him towards her. She smiled gently. "I thought of you, when I had to cast my Patronus. You were the first thing that came to mind."

He stared at her, in the way he usually did—in wonder. She touched his face, trapping the tear there.

"I haven't told anyone this," she said. "Not that anyone asked, exactly."

"What?" he pressed urgently.

"My Patronus...it's a doe."

He let that sink in for a moment, and he knew that she was watching in pleasure as he registered the fact. Then, he leaned forward and kissed her, the way you're supposed to when someone implies that they're your soulmate. They kissed each other in the Shacklebolts' musty drawing room and James couldn't care less about Dementors or plans of action. He had Lily safe in his arms, and she was kissing him, and what else mattered? Everything was right in the world, just for that moment, and that was enough.


End file.
